Wounds Heal, But Scars Go Deep
by DarthRuinous
Summary: A Holonet reporter asks a few questions and brings up a few memories. One-shot that starts out light and gets dark. Warning: significant violence


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"Midi-chlorians are not easily persuaded to execute the dictates of one newly initiated in the mysteries." – Darth Plagueis (_Darth_ _Plagueis_)

Wounds Heal, But Scars Go Deep

The gala affair was extravagant even by lavish Coruscanti reckoning. The speculation ran high for weeks before the event. The actual cause for celebration was hardly worthy of notice: the distant Dononter Sector was celebrating its first entry into the prestigious Senate. Who really cared about the new representative was anybody's guess, but every senator worth his, her, or its salt could not turn down a chance to drown the sorrows of war in dancing and drink.

Some time had passed since the last grand gathering, and so hundreds of Senators, diplomats, staff members, and even lowly interns turned out in colorful droves. Following the brightly attired throng came the Holonet cameras and reporters, dashing after the more famous, striving for a view of the infamous.

The Supreme Chancellor of the Galactic Republic was an obvious target of the media's affection. Palpatine began to regret ever showing up for the festivities when he had gathered two dozen reporters and countless camera droids the moment he entered the wide entry hall. He knew this was normal, knew he should take the chance to revel in the fact that they unknowingly idolized a Sith Lord as they clamored for his attention, but he was still adjusting to his new acclaim. His many years as Senator had been subtle and slow-moving. Although the occasional Holonet reporter had done a piece on the mysterious senator of Naboo from time to time, this was…quite the opposite.

Now senators groveled before him, news reporters hounded him, and rabid fans screamed his name whenever he made public appearances. The letters and proposals he received were initially amusing; now they were tiresome and slightly disturbing, even for a Master of the Dark Side. At least Sly Moore and Sate Pestage got some entertainment from it all. The Man of the Hour, they called him. And they sought him out with questions, every imaginable question, because truly, what was more news worthy than a being who sought its solitude? His personal guard protected him more from newshounds than assassins these days.

One particularly bold female human waved her press badge high in the air and neatly stepped into his path as he moved deeper into the entry room. Her golden hair was piled high on her head, and her manicured hands clutched a brightly colored Holonet datapad. She was a beautiful woman with the leer of a krayt dragon. "Chancellor," she purred, "Can you answer a few questions tonight?"

He forced a smile to his lips as he stared back at her, mellow gaze searching her perfect features, finally overturning an unpleasant memory. Kakka Freetaan, one of the Holonet's most determined and fanciful tabloid writers ever to prowl the Republic. Freetaan pursued only the wildest and juiciest tidbits about the politicians she shadowed. Palpatine was luckier than most, he supposed. She'd only gone after him once before, on rumors of a tragic marriage in his past. Well, that was news to him at least.

Now though, as the fledgling Supreme Chancellor, he was once again worthy of her scrutiny. What made people dislike politicians so much, Palpatine sincerely wondered, when creatures like these roamed the planet?

She coughed when he failed to respond, taking his silence for distraction. "Chancellor, really! You should stop thinking of your duties tonight and cut back. This is a party!"

"My duties, my lady," and it pained him to call her that, "are ever present, party notwithstanding. To ask me to abandon my office for a night of revelry would be great misuse of the people's trust."

She giggled, high-pitched and grating. Beside him, Sly Moore winced. "Of course, of course, the consummate politician! A man of the people, above and beyond the worldly delights that so ensnare the unwary."

On his other side, Pestage choked back a soft laugh. Freetaan's ever-ready ears caught the sound, and she grinned. "Or are you? Your aide is enjoying himself. Come now, Chancellor, you can be honest with me? What dark and delectable secrets do you hide deep in your soul? My readers await your answer with bated breath!"

Would it be permissible to use the Senate guard to put this woman out of her misery? No, probably not. The Jedi would likely frown on such a measure. "I make no attempts to hide my private life," he politely said instead. "If fact, if you wish it, my staff can provide you with a typical day's schedule. Meetings, and more meetings, you can assume."

He started to move again, but she stepped closer, eyes sparkling. One of the security guards moved closer in response. "Hard to believe a red-blooded man can live such a boring life on this world. Perhaps you areas innocent as you claim now, but what about your past? How could a humble senator of Naboo rise to be Supreme Chancellor of our esteemed Republic?"

Palpatine should have seen this coming. Every reporter always came back to his past, and he regretted not inventing a more detailed back story for public consumption when he had erased the true one. "The trust of my Republic seated me here, Lady Freetaan. I do not claim to deserve the position." And that was true. He deserved _much _better.

Freetaan's brilliant smile broadened. "You are very gracious. But come now, my readers are dying for information on you. You're so….mysterious." She reached out to touch his arm when the security guard let out a low growl, and she retreated. "For instance, your sleeves."

For a brief moment, Kakka Freetaan managed to bewilder the Dark Lord of the Sith. "My…sleeves?" he glanced down automatically. There they were, baggy and long, draping nearly over his hands.

"Oh yes," she laughed, delighted to have caught him by surprise. "It's a common question of my audience. They wonder why you always wear such long sleeves. Even Valorum, the old stick in the mud, wore short sleeves for the groundbreaking of the new Senatorial Gardens, but you, never."

"Well, yes, I suppose so," he trailed off, mild, thoughtful. Her question came out of the blue and was completely irrelevant to anything important, but it struck too close to home all the same. He tried to sidetrack her. "The people of Naboo dress in a certain style that many planets consider restrictive. I assure you, our culture takes great pride in the particulars. Even the colors hold significance."

"Oh, I'm sure they do, Supreme Chancellor, but we still wonder. We still love to…" and she licked her bright red lips, "…speculate. Is it a tattoo from your wild days of youth? A scar from some dramatic war wound? The unseen always holds the greater attraction than the visible, you know."

So it did, so it did. Made for a wonderful challenge at times, but she was not considering the same dark thoughts he was. "I am out of your league, I am afraid," he stood a little straighter, "and I apologize, but I must greet Senator Mon'taa'taak." And before she could protest, he swept past her into the main ball room, his staff members and Holonet reporters streaming after him in a long comet of excited voices.

But even as he grasped the slimy hands of the Republic's newest senator, Palpatine's mind returned to her question. He had not realized the long sleeves were so obvious, so eye-catching. On Naboo, it had never been questioned. As a senator, no one cared. Why long sleeves? Well, a simple answer for a simple question: wounds heal, but scars go deep.

xxxxxxxxxxx

"You wish something of me, Master?" Sidious kept his voice low, though his entire body was practically itching with impatience. A critical vote in the Senate was only hours away, and Plagueis was sitting before him, doing nothing, eyes closed. They sat together in Plagueis' state-of-the-art medical center on Coruscant, amid gleaming instruments and droning machines. "Master?"

"I do, but you do not seem ready, Lord Sidious," Plagueis rumbled. "Your thoughts dwell too eagerly with your political games. You must focus on the greater Force for what I desire tonight."

Sidious did not bother to protest. He merely folded his hands in his lap and maintained his position, head bowed slightly, but alert to every movement, every whisper of sound, every twist of the Dark Side that flowed around him and through him.

He had nearly slipped into a meditative trance when Plagueis again spoke. "Healing."

Sidious waited. Nothing. "Healing, Master?"

Plagueis repeated, "Healing. You are no good with it."

The words rankled him, mostly because they were true. "We discussed this before. Healing requires too much use of the Light Side. I cannot work with that…_filth_."

Plagueis opened his eyes at last. "You are no good at healing because you have pursued incorrect methods. I am going to teach you the correct method. Do you recall the conversation we had when I first introduced you to the concept of midi-chlorians?"

Sidious smoothed his cold anger to one side and nodded. "The Force requires proof that the user is capable of handling it well. You have often spoken of manipulating the midi-chlorians to do your will."

The Munn Sith Lord leaned forward across the small table that separated them. "So I did. And as midi-chlorians are neither of the light or dark side, then you should have no need to encounter the Light. Midi-chlorians can be used for healing."

Sidious hesitated. "Have you done this often?"

"Often enough to teach you. Give me your hand," and Plagueis held out his own long-fingered hand, slippery and warm, pulsing with the beats of his three hearts.

Sidious obeyed immediately, feeling the Munn's fingers tighten into a firm grip around his right palm. There it was: a feeling of being trapped, open to attack. Sidious gazed down at the back of his pale forearm, smooth and unblemished, dusted with fine ginger hairs, and he lifted his eyes to watch Plagueis.

The older Sith abruptly turned the arm over, exposing the fragile underside. "You humans," he grimaced, "such weak points you have."

His whole body screaming to pull back, Sidious sat in stony silence as Plagueis revealed a lengthy, gleaming steel blade. "Focus on the midi-chlorians as I have begun to teach you, and use them to stop the blood," the Munn instructed. "It will not be easy."

Then he slashed the blade down across Sidious' lower forearm, slicing through soft skin nearly to the bone, severing the life-giving veins and arteries. The younger Sith's arm jerked in automatic response, and he grunted softly.

But Plagueis was watching, so he gritted his teeth and sank into the Force, past the blinding waves of agony and involuntary tears and fired nerve endings, searching for the midi-chlorians that would serve him best. They eluded his grasp at every turn, at every heartbeat that splashed more blood across the table and his robes.

"Focus," Plagueis called, a dark and ominous shape before him.

Sidious felt the faintness that always accompanied blood loss, pushed it to the back of his mind. He reached out again, and the midi-chlorians must have been laughing at him, because he could hear something mocking him, taunting him. Was that Plagueis? It was getting too dark to see. The distant words were becoming muddled, running together like the fear and anger that were rampaging through his body.

Would the Munn let him bleed out on his table? Would Plagueis let him die? He could not answer with certainty either way, so although his head lolled on his shoulders and his life oozed out in an ever-growing circle, Sidious still fought for control. He let his anger solidify and burn deep inside. Anger that Plagueis was playing with him like some child's toy. Anger that he was not strong enough to bat Plagueis aside. Some of the Force-carriers began to respond at last, grabbing at the blood cells that rushed by in a mad gamble to escape.

Too slow, Sidious realized. He was still too slow. A cold and methodical part of his brain told him he was going to die. All the years preparing for the Senate, wasted. All the training in the Dark Side on forsaken backwater planets, useless…

He could not see at all anymore, and Plagueis was no longer calling to him. The pain numbed, the anger began to helplessly dissolve. Now all he wanted was sleep…sweet silence, where even the Force was only a dream…

He was jerked back into the living world by his stubborn teacher. Plagueis was leaning over him, hands on his forearm, willing the blood back into his body. Sidious snarled at the sight, but it was fascinating, watching the near effortless movements of his mentor, feeling the strength surge into his weak form. A rush of power, of new capacity, of new darkness, of deeper hatred.

Plagueis released his bloody arm and patted Sidious on the shoulder, without sympathy. "Not bad, for a first attempt. You did indeed have the midi-chlorians responding to you, but too late and too little."

Sidious felt his body trembling, and he tried to pull his arm against himself, tried to gauge the extent of the damage. But no sooner had he examined the newly covered wound, the bright red line, than Plagueis reached out and caught his other arm, pulling it taut across the table.

"Again."

xxxxxxxxxxx

The wounds had eventually healed. He still had to work to get the midi-chlorians to answer his will, and now that Plagueis was gone, many of his secrets of the mysteries of the Force went with him. But Sidious had learned enough. The smooth skin and bloody wounds were gone, but the scars remained. Plagueis was gone, but the hatred remained and made him stronger in the end. He was – he had to admit – grudgingly thankful.

But Force help them all if the real reason for his long sleeves ever made it to the Holonet.

**Another one-shot that just would not leave me alone until I wrote it. Palpatine's training fascinates me, and the Darth Plagueis novel only scratches the surface of what the Sith do to learn. I envision them as a variant of the Viking legend of "sink or swim." Apologies for any grammar mistakes that may be within.**

**What do you think? Feel free to leave a review!  
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